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It’s all about trusting the process; suspending judgment until each contender has been carefully scrutinized, fully performance tested, and then driven back to back over the same piece of road. Only then can Car of the Year be decided.

It’s a tough process–and not just for the cars: There are a lot of early mornings and late nights, discussion and argument, and a coffee and bagels. But, most of all, there’s a lot of driving. Each judge logged hundreds of miles over our test loops.

Nearly a week’s worth of track testing gave judges the baseline data to work with during their walk-around appraisals and initial drives. But it was the short but devilish handling course, devised by road- test editor Chris Walton, that enabled the judges to qualitatively explore the dynamics of each contender.

With its combination of twists and turns, including braking and rapid acceleration, the handling course was designed to bring out the worst in chassis, engines, and transmissions. Most important here wasn’t how fast a vehicle went around the course, but how smooth, quiet, and composed it felt. It’s here we learned how lumpen the Pontiac Solstice feels and how chuckable the Mazda5 is. More than a few judges, flicking the surprisingly entertaining Cadillac DTS sideways through a lane change, fielded calls from OnStar operators enquiring the nature of the emergency. Nice to know OnStar works.

The track testing, early drives, walk-around appraisals, and handling course didn’t quite tell us which would be Car of the Year, however. What they did reveal was which cars wouldn’t make it, leaving 10 finalists to face our Thousand Oaks loop, which packed almost every conceivable real-world road environment–from tight and twisty canyon roads to suburban back streets to lumpy, traffic-choked freeway–into just 32.6 miles. We spent the best part of two days pounding around that loop before we found our worthy winner. Yes, the process works.

The Criteriacar of the Year isn’t a comparison test. With 28 contenders ranging from over $14,000 to almost $75,000, covering every niche from two-seat roadster to six-seat minivan, it’s hard to find common ground when you simply look at the hardware. So we don’t. Instead, we evaluate each contender against three criteria: superiority engineering excellence, design advancement, utilization of resources, and safety are the key components of this criterion. Vehicle concept and execution, selection and use of materials, packaging, and dynamics are considered, as are styling and interior layout, fuel consumption, and primary and secondary safety features.

SignificanceHow well Does the vehicle do the job its maker intended it to do? It’s not just sales numbers that count here: How the vehicle may impact or change its particular market segment, influence consumer perceptions, and transform product development trends are also taken into consideration.

ValueEach vehicle is compared with its rivals in its market segment. While a vehicle with a low sticker price might seem to have an advantage, it may not be as good a value as a more expensive vehicle that offers higher performance and build quality, along with better functionality, lower running costs, and higher resale.